Design

LG has made a much more stylish smartphone than the LG G6 here. Dare we say that there’s something of the Galaxy S8 to the LG V30’s looks?

It’s similarly constructed, with a metal frame sandwiched by a glass front and back. There’s a familiar curvature to its front and rear edges too, though the effect on the front is nothing like as severe as the Galaxy S8’s dual-curved display.

Indeed, while both phones cut down on the bezel size compared to previous models, the Samsung is the much narrower device, and it’s also a little shorter. The LG makes up for this by being half a millimetre thinner, however.

Display

Samsung took our breath away with the Galaxy S8’s large 5.8-inch Super AMOLED display earlier in the year. It’s pretty much the best display in the business.

It remains to be seen if LG can match this - we suspect not - but it’s certainly having a good go. The LG phone is bigger at 6-inches and has a similar QHD resolution.

More importantly, the V30 sees the company returning to OLED technology, so it should have a similar level of vibrancy and deep blacks as the Galaxy S8. Some will also prefer the fact that the LG V30 display doesn’t curve off dramatically at the edges like the S8, which can lead to some light distortion.

Power

There’s nothing between these two phones on the power front. The Samsung Galaxy S8 is powered by an in-house Exynos 8895, while the LG V30 goes with a Qualcomm Snapdragon 835.

These are well matched processors, both made to a tiny 10nm process. Indeed, Samsung is involved with the making of both, and in some territories the Galaxy S8 even uses the Snapdragon instead.

With both phones going with 4GB of RAM, we’re expecting performance to be roughly equal between these two phones.

We should also mention here that the LG V30 looks to have the beating of the Samsung Galaxy S8 on the audio front. It features an impressive-sounding quad-DAC for superior music playback, while it also has a pair of high-quality B&O earbuds in the box.

Camera

Samsung was so pleased with the 12MP camera in its Galaxy S7, it went with more or less the same setup for the Galaxy S8. It’s still one of the best smartphone cameras on the market.

Of course, standing still is rarely a wise move in the smartphone field, and so LG has a real chance to give its local rival a bloody nose on the photographic front.

As such, the LG V30 has some formidable-looking specs. It’s a dual-camera setup with one 16MP sensor and one 13MP sensor. The main one has OIS and a f/1.6 aperture lens (that’s as bright as smartphone cameras get), while the second camera is a wide-angle example with a 120-degree field of view for a physical zoom effect.

LG is also placing a lot of emphasis on the LG V30’s video-capture capabilities. Cine Video enables you to adjust the colour profile of your videos in real time.

Battery life, memory and connectivity

LG V30 (3300mAh 64GB/128GB 4G) vs Samsung Galaxy S8 (3000mAh 64GB 4G)

LG is supporting its larger screen with a larger battery. At 3300mAh, it’s a bigger power unit than that of the 3300mAh Samsung Galaxy S8 equivalent.

Elsewhere, both phones come with 64GB of internal storage as standard, though the LG V30 also offers a 128GB option. Both feature microSD slots for up to 256GB of memory expansion.

Price and availability

We don’t have a price for the LG V30 at the time of writing, but you can bet that it will be near the top end of smartphone pricing.

If LG’s wise it won’t be as expensive as the Samsung Galaxy S8’s official £689 though. With the Samsung phone having been out for a number of months now, you can easily find it for around £100 less online.

We’ll know for certain some time September when the LG V30 is due to launch.

Conclusion

LG has been forced to play second fiddle to Samsung when it comes to flagship smartphones. That’s not to say that the LG G range have been bad phones, but the Samsung Galaxy S family has simply stepped up to another level in recent years.

The LG V30 looks to be the company’s best bet yet for taking Samsung on. It matches the Galaxy S8 in all the key areas - design, display, power - while offering little extras like a brighter dual-lens camera and a quad-DAC.

Whether this all comes together to form a true Galaxy S8-beater remains to be seen, but we’re excited to see this battle playing out.